


The thing in the barn, or: How Doh Kyungsoo learned to love again

by yerin_xo



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-25
Updated: 2019-07-25
Packaged: 2020-07-19 15:43:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19976521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yerin_xo/pseuds/yerin_xo
Summary: Kyungsoo is a loner who doesn’t like to have a living soul around, apart from his beloved animals.On the other hand, he is pretty sure neither ‘living’ nor ‘soul’ are words he can use to describe the thing that shows up on his farm during a stormy night.





	The thing in the barn, or: How Doh Kyungsoo learned to love again

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt T29: Kyungsoo finds a zombie slumped over in his hay barn, groaning something about "puppies" and "stole finger."

Summer usually was a nice time of year in this corner of the world. 

The valley being nestled in between the mountains whose dusty blue crowns seemed to curiously glance down into the valley from 3 sides meant it never got exhaustingly hot. And even during those months where elsewhere the sun burned down and turned grass and shrubbery into bristling brown touchwood, here all the water being sucked from plants, humans and animals alike would suddenly find itself pushed up against those very mountains guarding the valley. And like an angry onslaught of soldiers the humidity would pile up and up against it, slowly making its way upwards, without moving as much as the littlest stone on these ancient giants who waited them out stoically and unbothered. 

And, at some point this attack would cease, and the clouds which progressively darkened as they made their exhausting way up would find no other way than to dump their heavy wet freight, resulting in cooling short summer rains. 

Sometimes this heavenly army would get some well-needed help from thunder and lightning, and once in a while they would wound the colossal mountains they were up against, and a heavy rock would make its way down to the valley, accompanied by an elemental growl resounding every time it would bounce and break a bit more before tumbling on, sliding on mud and newly formed rumbling muddy streams down towards the vale. 

At the very bottom of the valley that slowly fell of from rocky steep walls to rolling hills, there was a lake, as big as an ocean, so wide most days you could not make out the other shore. The other side just as well could not have existed for those who had never left the valley. 

Some might find it weird how humans could spend all their life bound to one place, especially one as uneventful as this one.

But, it was not just a boring little piece of rural land. At least to Kyungsoo it was not. 

He and his parents, and before them his father’s parents and so on had tended to their fields, from the moment the last ice would disappear in spring through the golden summer months, til they could reap the heavy fruitful harvest as the days got shorter. 

Kyungsoo had lived here, just like generations and generations of his family before him, nestled against the foot of the mountains, where rocks and steep walls made room for luscious green fields, dotted with flowers and herbs of all kinds. There in the forests young, upright pines sprung up between the ancient oaks that spread their branches all around, each of them a universe to the countless small animals, birds and insects living under their protection.

As much as others wanted to go out and explore the world, the young farmer could not imagine anything that made it worth to leave this place he felt so deeply connected to, the roots binding him here just as old as those giving life to the ancient oak trees. 

And so Kyungsoo held out against anything the currents of fate and time and life threw at him, with much the same spirit with which the mountains stoically held out against tempests and time. 

He had carried on when his younger brother had left to fight in the army for a lord they had never seen, only to return dead - if you called an empty grave and a torn bit of his uniform ‘returning’. He had carried on when his heartbroken mother had died soon after, only to fill the graveyard with a much heavier casket this time. 

Soon after, following his father’s wishes his sister Soo Ah had married, moved away to the baker’s place in the village near the lake. 

His father had joined his mother only two years later, a serene smile on his face, even as his hands, tanned and knobby like the branches of an ancient tree had gone stiff. And when Kyungsoo felt as if the last lingering presence of the man that had guided him through life up to this point had left the room, he had closed his eyes, wondering when he would close them for the very last time. Would somebody be there to close his eyes once his soul had left? Would they do, with a heart filled to the brim with grief, and yet somehow still overflowing with love and thankfulness? And, as he set there, motionless for a few moments, the first pale rays of morning light fell through the small window. 

Kyungsoo had stepped outside into the fresh pale silvery morning light, and for a moment it felt like this endless tide of grief would never stop, just growing and growing, until it burried the whole world beneath it. 

He had wondered how a broken heart could be beautiful and terrible all at once, and as the sun slowly rose above him, growing stronger and stronger, he had made a resolution: 

Kyungsoo had always been happy by himself- Life was fragile, and some day death would stretch out his hand for everyone. He’d rather life a content and quiet life by himself than feel this excruciating pain, the pain of watching somebody leave this world - again. 

Is it possible a part of us dies when a loved one leaves us?, he asked himself as he blinked against the bright light, and maybe also against the tears in his eyes. 

Afterwards, he had taken care of the cows, and then he had went to the village to get the clergyman. 

A few days later Kyungsoo and his sister had buried their father in the little graveyard next to the church. 

He had hugged her as she cried, hugged her children and her husband, too, and then he went back to the little warm, went back to living his life. Quiet, and peaceful, and undisturbed.

So, he had carried on alone for a few years if you excluded the cows and chickens and bunnies, until his sister had gotten him a dog, a huge over energetic Bernese mountain dog that he named Channie. 

Another year later, Channie had returned home with a pudgy, short legged corgi stumbling after him through the last snow of the year, and so Baekku had become part of his new little mostly four-legged family as well. And most days he was content and happy and wouldn’t wish for anything else. 

On the other days, when he could feel the part of his heart that had gone missing.. he would go to the churchyard, lay down some wildflowers he had picked on the way, and then… then he would just carry on.

So he had lived for another six months, until one stormy night in August.

The angrily boiling clouds threw themselves up against the indifferent peaks above once more, while the wind howled around the little farmhouse at the foot of the mountains, tugging on every door and window and trying to creep inside. 

  
  


He blinked as Channie pressed his wet snout to his thigh, before shifting a bit so the giant dog could curl himself around him, still whining and scared out of his wits. 

“It’s okay, Channie”, Kyungsoo murmured, petting his ears, as yet another flash of lightning tore through the darkness outside for a moment. 

It was one of these summer storms, and as much as it seemed that heaven was doing its all to unsettle the very foundations of the earth, Kyungsoo was not too worried about it. 

As long as no fire erupted in one of the buildings the damage wouldn’t be to big. 

Usually he wouldn’t allow Channie into his bed, but on a night like this he would have felt cold-hearted to turn it away. 

Baekku, the corgi pup was a whole different deal. First, he was not really a pup anymore. While he hadn’t grown that much in size, he had definitely grown a bit heavier and pudgier, and he wiggled his big fluffy butt out into the world, uncaring and unscared, while Channie usually liked to stick close by Kyungsoo’s side, scared by as much as a bird flying by close or his little playmate barking a bit too loudly. 

Therefore, Kyungsoo wasn’t worried that Baekku hadn’t chosen to join them in bed yet. Even though tomorrow morning he would surely wake up with a certain fluffy butt in his face. 

After an hour of tending to the bigger one of his babies, Kyungsoo decided to buy himself a moment of free time with some dog food, and to make sure everything around the house held out aigainst the storm. 

He lit the candle on his nightstand, protected by a cylindrical glass around it, and trugged over into the living room and kitchen area. 

The room was clean and simple, but had a homely feel nonetheless, with his mother’s homemade curtains and tablecloths, and the handful of books him and his brother had collected over the years. 

However, something was missing. While he tried to figure out what it was, Channie had actually stopped whining for a moment, just as irritated as he was. 

They both realised at the same moment; Kyungsoo hastened to slip into his boots and shrugged into a heavy coat, while Channie was jumping up and down and scratching, barking at the door. 

“No, worries, we will find little Baekku”, Kyungsoo promised as he hastened over, trying to open the door - and almost crashing into it. 

Then he realised the wind was quite strong, and the door only opened when he threw his weight against it, swearing beneath his breath. 

He stumbled outside, almost slipping on the muddy ground, the candle in his hand flickering for a moment, almost dying, before he shielded it with his hand. 

Channie was barking at him, having already crossed half of the yard, over to the oldest barn, where he kept the hay and equipment. 

The dog was nervous, dancing around impatiently as he waited for Kyungsoo to catch up to him. 

Kyungsoo groaned in annoyance, squeezing his eyes against the heavy rain and wind. The young farmer had to hold his hand in front of his eyes to shield them against the heavy rain. Single droplets had already begun to run down on the inside of his coat and down his back, and slowly he began to wonder why Baekku had even decided to go outside with this kind of weather. 

Besides, how had the tiny dog even managed to open the door, when even Kyungsoo had troubles with it. 

He could have sworn Baekku had been in the house when he had went to bed, almost buried beneath the bigger Chanyeol, content as he nibbled on the ear of his giant friend. 

With the storm outside being that loud it was well possible for somebody opening the door for a moment without either Kyungsoo nor the terrified Channie noticing. On the other hand - dogs couldn’t open doors, at least those as tiny as Baekku surely couldn’t.

That meant, somebody must have opened the door, Kyungsoo realized, and suddenly the warm summer rain seemed to turn to ice on his skin. Then he shrugged off the thought, because who would even do that, it was ridiculous, really, and went on.

Kyungsoo was breathing heavily as he and Channie arrived at the gate of the barn, both of them silent and motionless for a moment as they stepped out of the rain and under the overhanging roof. 

Then, Kyungsoo almost believed he heard a faint bark through the wall, and even though he felt stupid he reached for a rusty shovel leaning against the wall, as Channie began to bark his lungs out again. 

Was that the first sign of him turning into a weird and distrustful grumpy old man? Was he going a little mad from his lonely life, as some elder man from the village had told him he would? (Not that he had asked, some people just loved to get involved in others’ business.)

Kyungsoo pushed the thought aside and spoke, without even thinking, raising the shovel like some kind of bat.

“I am armed and not alone! If anybody is in there, you better come out and surrender to us now!” 

In theory, neither of these things was a lie, he thought, his eyes wandering from his makeshift weapon to the coward of a dog next to him. 

He waited. Nothing happened, except that a particularly loud peal of thunder made Channie whine, Kyungsoo’s heart beat so fast he could hear the blood course in his ears. 

He counted, silently, and with the next boom of thunder he kicked the gate open, the wings of a door swinging open inwards - and, suddenly, his candle flickered up one last time before dying down in his trembling hand.

Maybe, maybe he was really seeing things. ...or maybe for a tiny moment he had really seen a huge, hunched over figure against the far wall of the barn.

He swallowed, his throat dry, hoping he sounded more threatening and less scared than he actually felt. 

“If you are a thief or some sort of wanderer, step outside. I don’t want to hurt you”, he warned. 

Kyungsoo hadn’t even finished speaking, as an excited little ball of fur wiggled towards them, Baekku yelping happily as he pressed his snout to Channies, who seemed determined to lick the other one all over to make sure he was okay. 

“There you are, you little rascal”, Kyungsoo said, more than just a bit relieved, and he figured he really just had been paranoid, a relieved bubble of laughter rising in his throat. 

Who would even try to steal anything from a humble farmer such as him? He had no fight or brawl with anybody, so the idea that somebody had come inside his house, and attempted to steal his stupid, fat, wonderful dog was utterly ridiculous, after all. 

He shook his head to himself, wondering how he could have been fooled by his own mind like this, when yet another lightning bolt chased across the sky above him and made everything around them seem as light as day for a split second. 

Kyungsoo yelped and stumbled back, falling down on his butt as the shovel fell from his weak fingers. 

“Oh my god”, Kyungsoo whispered, crossing himself with trembling fingers. 

Someone - no, something was in there. 

SItting against the far wall of the stable, huge and hunched down, as if ready to attack him at any moment. 

He stared on into the complete darkness of the stable opening up before him, and he didn’t even dare to blink, fearing that the very next moment the creature would be upon him. 

If hell existed, Kyungsoo realized, this is what looking at its gates must feel like. 

And yet, the thing had not attacked him yet. 

Whatever It was - for some reason, it had decided not to tear him limb from limb yet. 

For some reason Kyungsoo was very convinced that whatever might be in there, it would be very capable of doing so. He wasn’t a believer, neither into gods nor demons or ghosts, but it was if something invisible in the air warned him of the pure evil, the threat in there. 

Believing was one thing. Knowing was another. And Kyungsoo knew for sure that this… this thing was abnormal and dangerous.

With trembling fingers, keeping his eye fixed on the insides of the barn he reached for his matches.

He tried once, twice, three times to light the candle, swearing to himself with words that would have earned him a smack from his mother and he prayed for and yet dreaded another crack of lightning to show him if the creature inside had moved. 

Finally, he managed to light the candle, wondering if he should throw the doors shut and barrikade them, to run to the village to get help. 

Just as he realized that yes, he should have done that a long while ago, he heared it; an alien monstrous growl and groan, like the pits of a churchyard have opened as the decaying corpses tried to call out, but their teeth were already rotten and their vocal chords eaten through by worms and maggots. 

His blood ran cold and he wanted to scream, but he couldn’t, he was transfixed in his spot. 

Then, the hellish voice started to speak; “Hurt… hurt!”, it said and kyungsoo woke from his trance-like state, gasping and grabbing his shovel a bit tighter. 

“Who...who is there?”, he calls again, and the both dogs ran to his side when they heared the tremble in their beloved master’s voice. 

No answer, again, just the groaning, and then suddenly, Baekkie darted forward, disappearing into the barn again. Kyungsoo called out the corgi’s name, but, his scream was nothing compared to the infernal roar bursting from inside the barn, and without thinking any further he stumbled inside, set on saving his beloved puppy or to die trying.

To his surprise the hunched down wretched monster did not attack him but curled up in a corner, curling in on himself as little puppy Baekku stood in front of him and yelped, wagging his tail, poking his snout to the stick he wanted to play with. 

The creature whimpered and twitched, and in the light of the candle its huge shadow flickered up against the wall in manic spasms. 

“Baekku! Get back here!”, Kyungsoo called and the little dog whineed, only following the command when Kyungsoo repeated it, his voice a bit more stern. 

As he did so, he also picked up his new play thing and trotted back over. 

Kyungsoo crouched down to pet him, still keeping an eye on the creature that still seemed to be ignoring them - and… it seemed to be scared… and.... was that a sob? …. well, as much as one could sob with half their face rotten away. 

Outside, there was another loud growl of thunder, and the thing twitched, giving a miserable little noise. 

It’s was man, Kyungsoo realized now as the flames danced over the monster and his decaying, ripped clothes. Or well, at least it once had been man. Now… it was some kind of corpse. And, it was.. maybe not alive, but certainly it wasn’t dead. 

Baekku gave another excited bark and wiggled his butt, and for a moment Kyungsoo’s gaze flickered down at what the pup has dropped in front of his feet. 

Then, the creature began to speak, and in between these atrocious hellish noises Kyungsoo began to make out words. 

“Pu..puppies”, it heaved out. Kyungsoo blinked, wondered if he had really lost his mind. Maybe the creature has splattered his brains over the floor already and this was some weird death-hallucination? 

“Puppies?”, he heared himself ask then, and the monster flinched, turned to him for the tiniest moment and glared from milky eyes. Can it even see anything with those?, Kyungsoo found himself wondering through the elemental force of his horror, an icy shiver running down his spine. 

“Stole… finger.”   
For a moment, Kyungsoo just stared. Then, he lowered his eyes to the thing at his feet. 

And then, several things happen at once.

He screamed again and scooted back, falling on his butt once more, causing the monster to give another surprised outcry as it curled in on itself, and only now Kyungsoo realized it was cradling its hurt hand against its chest. 

The dogs go mad as they run around him and bark, confused and upset by Kyungsoo’s panic-

Somehow it really does seem more likely he is dying, and this is some weird hallucination his shutting down brain conjured up. In this case Kyungsoo would really like to complain. Couldn’t he just hallucinate about something less weird and terrifying?

But no, the puddle he fell into feels very real, just as real as Channie’s hot tongue and stinky breath in his face. 

“Jesus Christ”, Kyungsoo murmured, staring at the ripped of decaying finger in front of his feet as he pushed the cattle dog’s giant face aside. Now, beneath the leathery dried out skin he could actually make out the white of the bone and - he has to look away, his stomach turning. 

“Hurts.. hurts”, the monster whimpered again, and Kyungsoo shook his head, forcing himself to focus. 

He pushed himself up, bracing his stomach before he took up the creature’s finger. 

Baekku gave an excited bark and wiggled his butt, thinking his master wanted to play. 

“Sit”, Kyungsoo said sternly, before turning to that thing and continuing with the same tone of voice. 

“Promise me you won’t hurt me. Or my dogs. Then I’ll give you your finger back”, he demanded, hoping the tremble in his voice wasn’t too audible. 

SIlence, just broken by the heaving breaths, before the monster turned, accompanied by the rustling of clothes. 

“Promise… Nini promise”, itforces out in between some other indistinguishable noises. 

“Nini”, the creature repeated and looked up at him, his one hand still pressing the one with the missing finger against his chest. 

Now that he actually gets a good look at it Kyungsoo could not help but stare. The monster could only open one eye completely, the other one half-hooded by the the lid, one side of his face apparently somewhat paralyzed, the mouth hardly moving as it spoke.

Around these sunken in dead eyes the skin is leathery and shrivelled and cracked, tightly stretched over a set of high cheekbones and a defined chin, the skull covered in sticky wet black hair. 

Its- no,  _ his _ eye must have been brown while he still was alive. Still alive in the more traditional sense, Kyungsoo silently corrected himself, wondering if it is impolite to mention someone’s un-aliveness to them. Well, that’s a question he never thought he would have to ask. Or answer. 

“Okay”, Kyungsoo said and nodded slowly. 

“I… I will give your finger to you now”, he said then. He meant to take a step forward and another one, but he just couldn’t. He can’t bring himself to step closer to the not-so-dead dreadfully looking man in front of him. 

After a moment of consideration he crouched down, holding on to Baekku’s collar with one hand as he used his other one to roll the severed finger back towards the living corpse. 

It made an excited, happy noise, and leaned forward for a moment to grab it, and Kyungsoo felt a bit faint as he saw the set of impressive wide shoulder muscles work, the skin over them basically torn to shreds. 

If the undead would want to cause him harm… physically, he could easily win out over the farmer, despite the fact he had worked his body every day, as long as he could remember.

So, right now there seemed to be standing nothing in between him and death but a certain fluffy, death-defyingly brave corgi pup. 

But, apparently the undead is too focused on his finger anyways, trying to stick it back on, but it just falls down right away again. 

Kyungsoo watched a first try, then a second and third, and the monster growled in frustration. 

It’s utterly horrifying and gross and still shockingly fascinating, and somehow, somehow to Kyungsoo and his weird brain it even seems… cute?

“Nini”, he says then, and the undead looks at him, as Kyungsoo slowly gets up. 

“What are you even doing here?”

Shuffling for a moment, then, as the thing looked down at his severed finger:

“Nini scared.”

“Scared?”, Kyungsoo repeated a bit incredulous. He is the one who should be scared. Not… not the monster that made every ghost story seem like a friendly children’s tale. 

“Scared of the weather?”, he pressed on, and the undead nods, a few flecks of dead skin falling around his shoulders.

Kyungsoo shuddered. 

“Weather. Bad men”, Nini says, and his voice grew in volume, sounding angry now as he sits up.

Channie whimpered. Kyungsoo jumped back. Baekkie sat down to lick his own butt. 

After a moment the farmer realized the monster was upset, but it was not angry. 

Rather than violent… it really did seem scared. 

That’s when he heard it: Faintly, another bang, like from a hand on wood, and then he saw the light of flammes outside and heard voices calling his name.

Nini whimpered and hid behind his hand, rocking back and forth like a scared child. 

Kyungsoo looked on for a moment, frantically thinking - and yet, he knew he had already made his decision. 

He really must be more weirder than he ever realized, weirder than even the gossip of the village claimed.

“I… I won’t let anything happen to you. Just… just trust me, okay Nini? ... I’m Kyungsoo, by the way, and this is Channie and Baekku. They will protect you while I am outside.”

“Baekku bad. Bad puppy”, Nini said after a moment, his voice a bit more stern, like he was trying to imitate the way in which Kyungsoo had spoken to the pub earlier.Kyungsoo, against all odds, felt the need to laugh again, and found himself thinking once more that beyond its horrid exterior, Nini was actually really cute. 

“You’re not wrong there. So, what do you say? Do you trust me?”

Nini raised his head again, while Baekkie curiously sniffed on his toes. Kyungsoo only prayed the stupid dog wouldn’t decide to rip the apparently somewhat fragile undead into shreds while he is outside. 

“Soo”, the undead said then, still looking up at him, and something very much alive flashed through his milky eyes.

“Nini trust Soo”, he said then, his voice firm. 

“Okay. Okay”, Kyungsoo repeated, nodding to himself as the voices came closer. 

“I will be back in a moment.”

  
  


He slipped out the barn and pulled the gate closed just as the light from the torches touched his face.

It was a handful of men from the small town nearby, and he knew all of them, even though it took him a moment to recognize them, since they almost looked like strangers, smeared in mud and hair sticking to their foreheads, and with fear and hatred pulling their face into strange grimaces.

Somewhere in there he can see his own terror, the gut wrenching feeling that overtook him when he found that thing - Nini, he corrects himself - in his barn. 

He wasn’t close or particularly liked any of them, except one - Junmyeon, his sister’s husband and the local baker. 

“Kyungsoo”, he greeted him, and for once he wasn’t smiling brightly, instead sporting a concerned frown on his face. as he stepped closer and grabbed his forearm in what felt like a very stiff, very awkward hug. 

“Are you okay?”, he asked, as he stepped back, talking loudly so his voice could be heard over the rain that drowns out the world outside, as the men huddle together closer under the roof of the barn. 

He looked around, meeting stern, grim stares, reinforced by the torches drawing strange, dancing shadows onto their features. 

“Yes. Yes, I am okay, what happened?” 

The men shift, turn away or look at their mudstained boots, and when Kyungsoo turned back to Junmyeon, the other one looked tired and scared. 

“There has been a murder, Kyungsoo”, he said then, his voice grave. 

Kyungsoo stared back at him in shock, before asking back:

“A murder?”, not proud of the way his voice turned several pitches higher with surprise.

“Yes”, another voice said, and when Kyungsoo turned he found himself faced with a stranger. 

He must have missed him when he looked at the familiar faces earlier on.

“A young boy who works at the guesthouse. His name was Minseok, I believe.”

Kyungsoo stared at the stranger for a moment, an ill feeling crawling up his back. 

Minseok. He knew Minseok. He was a quick-witted, always friendly and funny lad, who had taken a liking to Kyungsoo, despite all the gossip the villagers spread about him. 

Kyungsoo wondered what he would think of him now, with Kyungsoo giving shelted to the monster that had murdered him.

The man in front of him was handsome, lithe and with narrow shoulders, but he looked lean and elegant, despite the dark shadows beneath his eyes, and the way his cheekbones seemed ready to pierce through his pale skin. 

Different from the other men he didn’t looked scared out of his wits, but focused and mistrustful.

He seemed less mudstained than the other men, somehow managing to look almost regal, a look supported by his expensive looking blue coat, with buttons that sparkled like real gold in the light of the torches.

His mouth was curled up in a soft smile that looked more like a sneer, and under long, elegantly curved eyelashes his dark eyes probingly burned into Kyungsoo.

The farmer gritted his teeth, and after another moment the stranger relaxed and stretched out his hand. 

“Kim Jongdae, at your service.”

Kyungsoo hesitated for a moment, then hetook the other’s hand and shook it. “Doh. Doh Kyungsoo.”

The golden buttons on the blood red lapels of Jongdae’s velvet jacket were almost glistened again as he turned for a moment, looking at the gates of the barn Kyungsoo had just pulled shut. 

“What are you even doing out here?”, Junmyeon asked.

Kyungsoo turned to him, caught of guard for a tiny moment, then he shrugged, nonchalantly, despite his booming heartbeat. If this was true, if Nini really killed Minseok, he was assisting a murderer right now. But, he could not think about this now, he could not let them see even a flicker of anything unusual on his face. 

So, he just waited for another roll of thunder to die down before he spoke. 

“The dogs went a bit mad with the storm and I put them in there so I could get some goddamned sleep.”

As if to prove his words, Baekku and Channie began to bark inside. 

Junmyeon nodded in understanding, and Jongdae turned back to him, apparently losing interest in the barn and Kyungsoo. 

Good, Kyungsoo thought, relief washing through him and yet he kept his expression sober. Somebody had died, after all. 

“So, what is it about a murder, you say?”

Junmyeon hesitated. “The murderer left the town and is on the run. We all saw him heard the screams and… I know this sounds ridiculous, but… I could swear it wasn’t a human, Kyungsoo. Maestro Kim was the one who discovered the poor boy and found the tracks leading here. I.. don’t want to unsettle you, but he is dangerous, Kyungsoo. Have you seen anything?”

Kyungsoo stared at his brother-in-law, and luckily, there was another roll of thunder, granting him a few precious seconds as his mind worked with lightning speed. 

How could he make sure they wouldn’t check the barn before they left? … And, did he even want them to leave? Nini could easily tear him limb from limb. And Kyungsoo wouldn’t be the first one to die at his ginormous hands, apparently. And, if not for him, who know who else would get hurt if he tried to outsmart them?

He hesitated for another moment. 

“Yes. Yes, I have seen him”, he said then, his voice grave to his own ears.

The men around them swore or anxiously shifted their weight as they clutched their torches, some even murmured prayers. 

Junmyeon sighed in relief. “Thank god. That bastard slit the poor boy’s throat from side to side.”

And for a moment Kyungsoo’s mind stutters. Slit his throat? But...he remembered how clumsy Nini’s huge fingers had looked, how stiff he had been as he took up his severed finger. Kyungsoo doubted he could hold a knife, much less use it to cleanly cut someone’s throat. And, with his bear-like strength he wouldn’t need a knife in the first place.

“So, where did you see him?” He frowned, hoped it looked like he was trying to remember, when actually his mind was racing to come up with something.

He could not send them back to the town or towards the lake. The mountains were dangerous during the nights, much more so with rocks and mud sliding down steep slopes towards the valley. 

“This way”, he said then, vaguely pointing towards the forest, and where it trailed along at the foot of the mountains. 

“Well, at least I think so. I just woke up and looked out the window, and in the darkness with all the rain… I’m not completely sure. But I thought I saw something huge moving there, and… and to be honest, it made my blood run cold.”

Kyungsoo just hoped they would buy into his act, including his faked shiver and they way he frowned as he looked into the round. 

“Should I put on my jacket and help you?”, he asked then, praying they wouldn’t take him up on his offer. 

Junmyeon shook his head. “No need. Town’s business, we will take care of it. Stay safe, Kyungsoo-ah.”

He nodded and wishes them good luck, before he forced himself to walk off towards the farmhouse, nodding goodbye at the stranger who called himself Maestro, who just stood there and stared at him for a moment, before he turned and followed the others.

As he stepped inside, not caring for once he dragged mud over his late mother’s beloved carpets, he heaved a sigh of relief.

Kyungsoo leaned against the door in his back and swore, raking his hands through his dripping wet hair. 

What was he doing? Nini … he was a monster, and he probably killed somebody. But, somehow, this story didn’t add up. And then, this weird stranger showing up around the time of the murder? Sure, Minseok didn’t have any sort of proof to begin with, but that guy just gave him the creeps. 

He waited for another few minutes, until he was sure the townsmen and the stranger accompanying them were well off the farm, impatiently pacing through the tiny room, then he sprinted back over the yard, not even daring to take a candle with him this time. And, somehow, now that the night’s terror had a name, especially a name as cute as Nini, he was not scared anymore of the darkness surrounding him. 

He knocked, just once. “Nini?”, he whispered. 

Inside everything stayed silent. 

He pushed the door open, slowly, just a bit of light falling inside, his own shadow huge along the floor. 

For a moment he thought the room was empty, that Nini must have sneaked out while he was gone and suddenly icy fear washed over him. What would the townspeople and that weird stranger do to the poor creature?

“Nini?”, he asked again, a bit louder as he stepped inside. 

Then he heard Baekku’s soft bark, and his fluffy snout appeared behind the corner of the ancient carriage that Kyungsoo hasn’t used in years. 

Next to Baekku, Channie appeared, happily wiggling his tail, and a moment later the head of the not so dead corpse came up next to theirs, his hair just as fluffy and unkempt as Channie’s, now that it was beginning to dry. 

“There you are”, Kyungsoo sighed and allowed himself to relax a bit as he smiled - and then, suddenly, all hell breaks loose. 

Out of the corner of his eye he sees something move, and more out of curiosity than caution he starts to turn. 

Then, Channie gives a loud bark and leaps forward with an angry growl, while a bloodcurdling, terrifying scream echoes through the barn.

Kyungsoo feels a slicing heat on the back of his head and something collides with him, sends him crashing forward against the ground. 

Before he can even begin to understand what is going onChannie whisks past him, 100 pounds of angry protective muscles, and the next moment there is another scream, almost drowned out in Channie’s growls.

Kyungsoo feels himself being lifted up by a pair of huge, corpse-like hands as Nini helps him to sit up, his scent of cold earth surrounding the farmer. 

“Soo!”, he says and shakes him so hard his teeth rattle against each other, while Baekku whines and presses his snout into Kyungsoo’s side. 

Kyungsoo blinks, confused, feeling a bit dizzy, like somebody just took his brain and scrambled it before shoving it back into his head.

“Soo not hurt!, Nini says then, his voice urgent and scared, and Kyungsoo hastily pats his hand, while he feels for the side of his head. 

When he pulls it back its sticky with blood, but as far as he can tell he isn’t seriously hurt. 

“I’m okay Nini, don’t worry”, he sighs and turns to where Channie holds his attacker pinned against the floor, snarling, baring his teeth just a hand away from the guy’s throat. 

He expected it to be that weird stranger, but instead it’s one of the townspeople. 

Jeonghan, if he remembers correctly. His eyes are wide, terrified as he doesn’t dare to even move an inch with the angry dog sitting on his chest. He must have dropped his torch, and it’s lying a few feet away, well out of reach, throwing all their figures as tall dark shadows up against the walls. 

It’s silent for a moment, then Kyungsoo shakes his head to clear his head and asks: 

“What the hell?!”

Channie growls, still on high alert, and Kyungsoo takes the chance to get up with Nini’s help and grab a pitchfork off the wall. 

Not that he seriously plans on impaling the guy, but hey, giving of the impression won’t hurt. 

“Channie. Come here!”, he orders, and after a moment and another threatening snap of his jaws, Channie jumps off the guy and runs to his side. 

“Alright, I want to know what’s going on he”- before he can even finish the sentence, Maestro Kim seems to appear out of thin air, delivering a hit with his torch to the side of Jeonghan’s head with so much blunt, precise force the other one is knocked out cold without uttering a single sound. 

He tilts his head to the side, nudging the man with his foot before looking up and smiling at the little group assembled before them. 

Then, he steps over the man on the ground, as if it was just an annoying object blocking his way.

The corners of his mouth are dragged up into a lazy smirk, and he looks right past Kyungsoo, his dark eyes cold and burning with anger at the same time. 

“Well hello there Jongin. I’ve missed you, my ugly little creature.”

  
  


Kyungsoo takes a step forwards, placing himself between Nini - Jongin? - and Maestro Kim. 

“I know I might be repeating myself, but… what the hell?”, he asks. 

The Maestro’s smirk widdens and spreads his arms wide in and almost inviting, innocent looking gesture. 

“I would love to explain, but we are a bit pressed on time here.”

He turns to Jongin then, his voice switching from silklike sultry pleasentness to smooth steel in a single breath. 

“Kill him and these annoying mutts so we can finally leave this dirty little nest”, he orders. 

Kyungsoo’s heart does a nervous little sumersault in his chest.

Nini wouldn’t - he turns around, looks up into a set of very terrified, very alive eyes. 

Then, Nini looks down. 

“Jongin. You heard what I said! Do it!”, the Maestro repeats, not even raising his voice, but with so much authority even Kyungsoo feels the need to comply with whatever he says. 

Nini shuffles his feet, murmurs something. 

“What?”, the Maestro asks. 

“Nini like Soo. Not hurt Soo!”, the monster says then, his voice loud and booming, and he sounds rebellious, almost like a disobedient child.

For some reason, Kyungsoo finds his throat closing up, his eyes almost teary from Nini’s stubborn, heart-warming words. 

But, this is not the time for heartfelt confessions. 

“Well, Maestro Kim. I think you want to answer some of my questions now. Because otherwise I’ll have you turned in and hanged for not one, but two murders.”

The Maestro gives a short laugh. 

“This idiot here?” he asks and lightly shoves at Jeonghan’s body on the floor.

“He’s unconscious, not dead. He’ll wake up and not remember a goddamn thing, I made sure of that. As for the boy… he saw my ugly little creature and I couldn’t risk leaving him alive. I had no other choice but to kill him. It is your fault anyways”, he said then, turned at Nini. 

He sounds so easy, so unimpressed, like he is just making idle conversation and not confessing to murder. 

Kyungsoo doesn’t say anything. Instead, he takes a deep breath to calm his nerves.    
“Alright. Maestro, you might want to be careful, or there will be another murder. And this time, you will not be the one delivering the blow.”

The other one draws up an eyebrow, still smiling. 

“Well, I see. With my not so faithful servant suddenly changing his alliances, I see myself hopelessly outnumbered… but, I am sure we will find an arrangement where nobody finds himself dead or in a cell.”

Kyungsoo highly doubts that, but it’s a step in the right direction. 

“We’ll see”, he answers reluctantly, while Nini seems to lose interest in the conversation, now that their tone of voice has softened. He instead squats down, petting Baekku’s head, before throwing his torn off finger into the corner, Baekku yipping and happily darting off on his little legs to fetch it. 

Kyungsoo pinches the bridge of his nose, wondering if he was still dreaming.

And, for the time being he would just have to handle this situation as what it was. 

“Tell me everything I need to know”, he demands of the Maestro then. 

“Everything?”, the Maestro asks, a bit amused. “Well, in the beginning, there certainly was no benevolent god who created the universe to revolve around us, let’s start there.”

Kyungsoo huffs. “Stop being clever with me. We don’t have time for your jokes, who knows when Suho and the others will be back?”

“Let me tell you I know with certainty they will be busy for quite some time, but... where shall I begin, then?”

  
  
  


The Maestro straightened out his jacket and pushed back his hair, wet from the rain, as he began to explain: He had found Nini on a battlefield as he was looking for somebody who he could practice his skills on. As a necromancer, a warden of the dead, he had been drawn to the place, even before the first man fell. 

He had just finished his studies under the guidance of a man who called himself the Medicus, and who had taught him how to squeeze a fleeting, wandering ghost back into its own corpse, transferring it into a will-less, dumb creature that would follow your every order, be it to fetch you a book, kill its former family or throw itself of a cliff. 

The Maestro had waited for the respective armies and aid men to disappear, then he had wandered over the field, excited to pick out his very first undead servant. 

However, he had found himself disappointed - many of the soldiers had been dismembered, cut open so their stinking, rotting intestines spilled out and turned the formerly green meadow in a muddy, fly-infested slaughterhouse. 

So many dead to pick from, and yet none could meet his standards. 

It was already closer to morning, and slowly but surely the souls had began to disappear, dissipate, one by one, like smoke, whisked away by a gust of wind. 

Except one - that soul had been bright, glowing, it had looked almost alive as the Maestro had made his way towards the greenish pulsing little thing. 

He hadn’t brought a torch, but the pale moonlight and the ghosts all around were enough to illuminate the figure he had found:

A young man, beautiful even in death, with mortal paleness beneath his tanned skin. 

He seemed unharmed, almost, except that his neck was twisted at a very weird angle. 

And as the Maestro crouched down, brushing some dirt off this handsome face, he had made a gruesome discovery - the man wasn't dead. Not completely at least. 

Unconscious, very likely to never wake up again, and yet, his blood was still pumping, the lungs still working, his blood still flowing. 

Sure, it all was slowly, halting and stuttering, like the last weak strokes of a butterfly as the first frost arrived, but… he was not completely dead. 

The Maestro felt his heart sing, excitement rushing through him - as much as anything can rush through somebody who has come so far on the path of the eternally undead.

This… this was something new. In the hundreds of years the Medicus had been alive, he had never tried to use his dark magic to bind a soul to a body that was not completely dead yet. 

In all the books he had read, written with dried up blood, or with white ink on black parchment he had never read of any of the masters doing something similar. 

This was something new. The Maestro was only 70 years old - “70 years?!”, Kyungsoo interrupted him incredulously. 

Maestro Jongdae looked at him, the corners of his mouth drawn up, almost disgusted and yet he looked smug. 

“Yes. The rules of mere humans don’t apply to me. I will still look as young as I do now when your bones and the bones of your children have long turned to dust. Now, don’t dare to interrupt me again, unless you want to wake my anger.”

...only 70 years old, and yet he would already write history, would do something so great, so unthought of, that his name would be known for aeons, whispered with reverence among the students of the dark path. 

So, he had gotten to work, quickly, hastily, fearing the body before him would do his last breath before he could finish the required rituals. 

But, of course, he had managed to do it. Had done, what no other death warden had done before; 

And, just as the first pale light of the morning fell over the battlefield, with the soldiers returning soon to loot the corpses and look for missing friends, one struck down soldiers had opened his eyes again. 

The Maestro took a deep breath, interrupting himself for a moment, and for a tiny moment his mask of narcissism and arrogance seemed to slip as he turned to look at Nini who was still sitting on the floor, slowly, clumsily patting Baekku who had curled up on his lap. 

“Did it work?”, Kyungsoo asked, turning back to the necromancer. 

Jongdae frowned, crossing his arms. “What do you think, you stupid lad? I can bend the forces of the universe at will, I have talked and battled beasts that would drive you to madness should I only speak of them... Of course it did work. If anything, it did work a bit too well. An undead servant is meant to be an object, nothing more. A tireless machine that does what you tell it to, without growing restless, without complaints, without disobeying.”   
“But Nini does disobey”, Kyungsoo realized. 

Jongdae’s face grew dark. “Yes. He disobeys, he feels, to a certain extent he even thinks and decides for himself. His creation is still a feat worthy only of a powerful magician, but since then I have woken many others. Jongin is my first creation, but having an undead, unwilling servant is tiresome. I’ve been alive for a long time, but taking care of this wretch can make a decade feel like a century.”

Kyungsoo hesitated for a moment,knowing full well he would probably regret his next question. 

“How… how long ago was it that you found Nini?”   
Jongdae shrugged, smoothing out an invisible crease in his expensive cloak. 

“Once you are immortal, time is not a unit you care about, boy.”   
Kyungsoo frowned. “Which war was it, then?”

Jongdae frowned as he tried to remember, his eyes following Channie who trotted through the barn to Kyungsoo’s side. 

“The falcon kingdom and the dukedom of the wolf, if I remember correctly.”   
“That was… almost 100 hundred years ago”, Kyungsoo said, his voice sounding a bit faint and distant to his own ears. 

He turned around, sounding almost accusing as he asked Nini: “You are one hundred years old?!”

Nini who had been cautiously petting Baekku, raised his head at him for a moment, confusion in his milky white eyes, before the beagle nudged his hand, asking to be petted again, turning the undead’s attention back to him.

Kyungsoo felt a bit dizzy, wondering once again if this was all some bizzare dream. 

How had his quiet, peaceful life suddenly split open to let in bizarre, somewhat cute monsters, and a murderous necromancers without any morals or remorse? 

He pinched the bridge of his nose. 

“So...what now?”

The Maestro shrugged. 

“I told you I was tired of him.”   
Then, in a more quiet voice, his gaze fixed on Nini, he continued: 

“He grew up not far from here. I figured it would be fitting to return his body to its home, before getting rid of him.”

It took Kyungsoo a moment to comprehend these words. 

“You… you want to _ kill  _ him.”

Jongdae turned back to him, a faint smile on his face, and suddenly he seemed older, more tired, and Kyungsoo could only wonder what it was to be alive for such a long time. 

“He already is dead. All I did was prevent him from taking the eternal rest for a few decades.”

“But… you said it yourself! He feels and he thinks and he is everything but dead!”

He felt a soft tug at his side and when he looked down Nini had stretched out his hand to grab Kyungsoo’s, obviously upset by the way the other had raised his voice.

Kyungsoo took the undead’s hand in his, giving it a reassuring squeeze, somehow repressing the shudder he felt at the dead, dried out flesh and sinews beneath his touch. 

“The alternative would be to set him free. What do you think would happen then?”

Jongdae shook his head again. “He is a monster, a harmless one, but fear is a powerful force. I can mask him with my charms when he is near me, so the common folk only sees him as a slow, mute servant. But without this protection they will hunt him down, and eventually he will be killed, no matter what. I know you think he is harmless, but I have had him kill before. If they try to harm him, he will cause mayhem and bloodshed, but in the end...he will die.”

As Jongdae spoke Kyungsoo had turned back to Nini who had tilted his head to the side and made a soft sound that reminded him a bit of how his dogs reacted when they sensed he wasn’t in a good mood. Nini tried to smile, and despite the grotesqueness of it Kyungsoo felt himself melt. 

“There  _ must  _ be another way”, he said. “There must be.”

“There isn’t.”

“Well, then I will have to tell them that you killed Minseok. And that you almost killed this one here, too”, Kyungsoo said and shrugged towards the unconscious man on the floor. 

For a short moment he saw anger flare up in Jongdae’s black eyes.

“So what will you have me do?”, Jongdae spit out. “Do you offer to take care of him?!”

“Actually, I do”, Kyungsoo replied, his voice firm, and only as he spoke Kyungsoo realized how true these words were. 

Yes, Nini might have killed, he might be a nightmare-ish monster and, all of that aside a decaying corpse, but… but somehow he reminded Kyungsoo of the unassuming innocence of his animals. 

Nini hadn’t hurt him, even though he could do so easily, and Kyungsoo could have sworn on his parents grave that he would never harm anybody willingly. Not if he had another choice. 

He blinked, looking the necromancer dead in the eye, his mind set. 

“I will take him off your hands and keep him safe. I will not denounce you as the vile murderer you are… but, I have a few conditions.”

Jongdae snorted. “Of course you do.”

  
  
  


Kyungsoo laid out his conditions, and the necromancer seemed to be torn between amusement and annoyance, but in the end, he agreed.

So, after Jongdae had worked his charms on the unconscious man to make him forget what he had seen in the barn, he additionally worked a sleeping charm on him, making sure he wouldn’t wake up anytime soon. This way, they could dump him somewhere near the woods, where either he would be found or come to his senses the next day. 

Jongdae would then simply return to the village, pretending that they had had a run in with the creature’ they were looking for, narrowly escaping with his life. 

That left them with just two, but still rather grave problems: 

The fact that Jongdae  _ had  _ killed the boy in the village, which might have left him unbothered, but still was heavy on Kyungsoo’s conscience. 

“He saw through the charm I placed on Nini. Which means he does have certain magical abilities”, Jongdae had mentioned almost reluctantly, as he sat at the kitchen table, nursing one of the cups of tea of the Kyungsoo had prepared. 

Kyungsoo had changed into fresh, dry clothing, and was sitting across from him, while outside the storm had died down, the rain slowing to a light drizzle. 

Jongdae meanwhile had shrugged out of his heavy coat and hung it by the fire he had lit in the fireplace with a snap of his fingers. He looked handsome, albeit ghostly pale in his white shirt, seemingly unbothered by the way he was still wet to the bones. 

Nini was meanwhile busy inspecting the dogs’ toys, the both of them delighted about their new playmate, meaning they kept themselves busy. 

“He had some abilities, so what?”, Kyungsoo asked, returning to the matter at hand as he sat down, his own cup in hand. 

“They guy is dead, so what does that matter?”

“I could resurrect him and turn him into my student. If he decides he would rather follow the dark path than dying a second death.”

“… what if he doesn’t want to become a necromancer?”

“What if he decides that he does not want to live for eternity, learn magic and escape death, you mean?”, Jongdae asked, his voice cool. 

“Well, it would be an eternity spend by your side”, Kyungsoo replied quietly, before taking a sip of his cup. 

Jongdae raised an eyebrow. 

“You know, I could still kill you in an instant, and just get up and leave?”, he asked then, sounding almost friendly as he did so, turning his cup between long, pale fingers. 

“Right. Sorry.”

There was a moment of silence. 

“So… we just do what? Steal his corpse?”

“Yes, but that shouldn’t be an issue”, Jongdae said and shrugged. 

“My abilities will turn that into a rather easy feat. I am more worried about your second request.”

“Well, you either figure out a way to bring Nini back to life - properly this time - or our deal is off”, Kyungsoo said and crossed his arms. 

“Well, it is not as easy as you might think”, Jongdae replied slowly. 

“You said he wasn’t dead back when you found him on that field. Who says if you...I don’t know, pull your creepy dark magic out of him he won’t just wake up and be alive again?”

“100 years of his corpse slowly decaying and every law known by chemistry and physics say so. Not even mentioning the magical aspect of it!”, Jongdae gave back, a bit irritated now.

“Right. So…?”

“It will take time. I will have to do research, experiments….”

“How long?”

“I don’t know how long! A year, maybe 5, maybe 20. Maybe it’s impossible.”

“You said his creation was a feat worthy of only a powerful necromancer. So wouldn’t his actual resurrection be an even bigger achievement?”, Kyungsoo pressed on, playing to the vanity and arrogance of the magician across from him. 

“Well… I assume… there is a way. It requires some...formulas and...special ingredients though.”

“You are  _ not  _ going to kill somebody else”, Kyungsoo said.

Jongdae looked at him like he was stupid. 

“I wasn’t talking about that. I might need something from  _ you _ .”

Kyungsoo frowned, a slight sense of danger creeping up his neck. 

“What do you need?”

“Any deceased friends or relatives you still care about dearly?”, Jongdae inquired offhandedly.

Kyungsoo blinked, his tongue suddenly feeling heavy in his mouth, so he just gave a quick nod. 

“Oh dear.” Jongdae sounded amused, but his voice seemed coated by a bit of remorse as well. 

“My condolences. Well… if you want me to resurrect Nini, it will take more than chemicals and spells. It will take another powerful force. A force my master used to call the most powerful in the universe.”

Kyungsoo leaned forward a bit, intrigued almost against his will. 

Jongdae could resurrect the dead, at least to a certain extent, he could play with people’s minds and start fire at will. What could be even more powerful than that?

Jongdae seemed to enjoy the attention for another moment. 

“Love. What I need is love.”

“That’s it?”, Kyungsoo asked, a bit disappointed. 

“Don’t underestimate this force, my young friend. Love can cross the barrier between life and death, and it can bind the souls of the deceased to the world of the living. If you still truly love and miss these people, that means their spirits are still here, watching over you.”

Kyungsoo stared at him. 

“Does that mean… they still see me?”

Jongdae nodded. 

“Now, if you allow me to take this force from you to use it to resurrect Nini... which, again, I cannot promise will work, you will lose some dear memories of these people. And, their souls will be set free. Unless, somebody else still remembers them,of course.”

“Will...will it hurt them?”

Jongdae shrugged. 

“Not really. Most souls are more bothered by it than anything else, to be honest. Of course it’s nice to watch on how your loved ones are doing, but most souls would rather continue on in their journey to the afterlife.”

Kyungsoo felt his head spin. 

His parents, his brother, they were still here. Somehow, in some sense, they were watching over him. And he was about to trade that in for the remote chance of resurrecting a murderous creature. A murderous creature that was wrestled to the ground by an overly adoring cattle dog right now. 

He whistled. “Channie, get off him!”, he ordered before turning back to Jongdae. 

“So… what now?”    
“Now, we go steal a corpse.”

  
  
  


So Kyungsoo found himself next to Jongdae and Nini, the later one seeming rather unenthusiastic at the fact he had to come along instead of playing with Channie and Baekku. 

But, when he was with them, Jongdae could work his charms to make sure he wasn’t discovered. And, he could help them move the corpse back to the farmhouse. 

“Your charms didn’t work last time, though”, Kyungsoo had noted as they walked through the outskirts of the village, where everything was quiet and dark at this time of the night. At least by now the rain had stopped, and yet his shoes where still wet inside, more wetness soaking in whenever his foot landed in a puddle.

Apparently he was the only one bothered by such mortal issues, though. 

“Yes. Maybe one in a hundred thousand men is immune to it. It is basically impossible we get detected.”

“Well, it was possible last time”, Kyungsoo said. 

“Yes, and aren’t you glad it was? Otherwise we wouldn’t be here”, Jongdae said with exaggerated friendliness.

“Here, stealing a corpse, you mean?”

Jongdae was about to answer, when suddenly his eyes widened and he motioned for them to shut up. 

A moment later, a man armed with a lantern came around the corner. 

“Hold up! Who are you?”, he called out, raising the lantern, and Kyungsoo realised it was Sehun. He knew the boy, he was still as pale and thin and boyish looking as when he went to school with Kyungsoo’s younger brother. And now on top of that he seemed terrified, albeit determined, as he blocked their way.

“It’s me, Sehun.”   
“Kyungsoo! What are you doing here?”

He remembered what Jongdae had told him to say, and when he turned to look at the other he almost screamed. Suddenly instead of Nini and Jongdae there were two strangers. 

Except, when he looked closer…

“Kyungsoo?”

“Uhm. Yes. These two travelers knocked on my door. Their ship sank on the lake, and they almost drowned, I just wanted to show them the way back to the port.”

Sehun didn’t seem entirely convinced. 

“I...alright. You may pass. But...you really shouldn’t be out there alone. haven’t you heard about the monster?”

Kyungsoo looked at the guy who strangely resembled Nini, and at the same time looked nothing like him. It was a bit like looking at the strange, swimming outlines of a well familiar object subdued in water.

“I...yes, I’ve heard about it”, he managed to say, and next to him Jongdae shook his head, a bit exasperated.

After that, they managed to sneak into the doctor’s office without being seen, where Kyungsoo, felt himself a bit overwhelmed by the reality of seeing somebody else he knew, even if it wasn’t closely, lie dead in front of him. Minseok was only 17 or 18, with full round cheeks and pretty even in death. 

If Jongdae’s stare was anything to go by, he thought so, too.

“Would have been sad to let such a pretty young thing go to waste, anyways”, he murmured as he instructed Nini to lift up the boy’s body.

Outside, he conjured up a thick fog that helped them to make for a quick, quiet escape back to the farm unseen. 

By this time there was already the first hint of a sunrise in the east, so they hurried to drop the unconscious guy just off the road to the mountain path, before returning to the farmhouse. 

By now Kyungsoo felt absolutely depleted, and he wanted nothing more than to finally fall asleep, but he didn’t trust Jongdae enough to leave him out of his eyes even for a moment. 

Yes, maybe the necromancer could be snarky and funny, but he still lacked all morals.

Even though Kyungsoo was beginning to suspect his uncaring act was just that - an act. 

Being immortal must be rather boring and lonely, he supposed, as he watched Jongdae set up his kitchen for the resurrection ritual. 

After all, he had kept Nini, whom he claimed to hate, at his side for more than a century. And now that he was letting go of him, he swiftly brought in a student for himself. 

Maybe he was a mental case, but maybe he also was not entirely  _ bad _ . 

Jongdae was apparently dead set on challenging that belief, as he brought out all sorts of black candles, herbs, cristalls, and cut open Minseok’s wrists to gather his blood and draw all sorts of bloody runes and symbols around the table he had pushed up against the wall. 

If anybody decided to pay him a very early visit, he sure would be burned as a worshipper of evil spirits, Kyungsoo thought a bit uneasy. 

Luckily, they had positioned Channie and Baekku outside, so their barks would warn them should anybody approach, so this scenario was rather unlikely.

Nini seemed unbothered by the whole procedure, after all he had probably seen this a thousand times, instead he was busy to inspect his finger, that Jongdae had witched back on with some gestures and a murmur. 

If he wouldn’t be such a pain in the ass, the necromancer would be incredibly useful to keep around, Kyungsoo mused. 

“You might want to step back, if you don’t want to die a painful, horrible death”, Jongdae informed him, and so Kyungsoo did, pulling Nini with him back towards the doors leading to the bedrooms. Jongdae began to recite things in some ancient, evil sounding language, consulting a creepy looking book, the writing in a suspicious brown color that looked a lot like dried blood. 

As he recited and gestured he kept lighting candles, burning herbs, drawing bloody symbols onto poor Minseok’s pale body. 

At first, nothing seemed to happen. Then, the light from outside seemed to grow pale, and when Kyungsoo looked a bit closer he realized some sort of blackish fog was clouding in the room, and the symbols Jongdae had drawn started to emit a slight, green glow. 

Kyungsoo felt his head spin and nausea rose in his throat, as if his body was trying to tell him that something weird, something dangerous was going on here. 

But, he forced himself to stay still, to watch on, and Nini took his hand again, obviously noting how Kyungsoo wasn’t taking this well. 

Slowly, Jongdae’s voice rose in volume, and he took off his own shirt, exposing a dark, circular mark above his heart. 

He took up a knife, and Kyungsoo took another step back, his whole body beginning to tremble and shiver. 

Nini stepped behind him to support his weight, wrapping both his arms around the smaller man, and so they watched on as Jongdae carved the same mark he bore into Minseok’s chest. 

The moment he drew the circle around it closed and fell silent, the smoke dissipated, the greenish glow disappeared. 

Then for a moment nothing happened. 

“Did… did it work?”, Kyungsoo whispered. 

Jongdae looked at him and blinked. “I don’t...I’m doing this for the first time, okay?”

Kyungsoo was about to complain, because,  _ dude, there is blood everywhere, if you did this for nothing-  _

Minseok coughed and they both froze to look at him as he slowly blinked his eyes open. 

“You”, he said then as he looked at Jongdae, slowly sitting up, some of the crystals placed on his chest clattering to the ground. “You fucking killed me!”

Jongdae took a step back, raising his hands in defense. 

“Well… to be fair… yes. But, in my defense, I did bring you back as well.”

Minseok opened his mouth to reply before blinking and looking around the room. 

“What the fuck is going on here?....Kyungsoo?!”, he asked then, a bit incredulous. 

Kyungsoo waved, as much as this was possible with Nini still wrapping his arms around him.

“I know I am repeating myself, but...what the fuck?”

  
  
  


Kyungsoo went about cleaning up the remains of the ritual and preparing breakfast as Jongdae explained everything to Minseok. 

To their surprise, the boy took the whole thing a lot more relaxed than they had expected, even going as far as to apologizing to Nini for freaking out about him earlier that night. He also seemed to not even blink an eye or be bothered at Jongdae’s arrogant behaviour, managing to leave the necromancer speechless a few times in their short conversation. 

“How are you so unbothered by this?”, Kyungsoo asked him as Jongdae prepared himself to return to the village and play the victim of yet another attack of the vicious vile monster. 

Minseok shrugged as he tried again to take his own pulse, before giving up as he found himself certainly dead instead, leaning against the kitchen counter as he watched Kyungsoo cut up cheese and bacon. 

“Well, I’ve been seeing ghosts as long as I can remember. So, I figured there was a lot more out there than anybody, even me could perceive. Speaking of, your mom really does love the new flowers you planted. And your brother is so bummed out that you didn’t get married still.”

“Uhhm”, Kyungsoo replied. 

Minseok looked to the side, his eyes glazing over as he seemed to listen attentively. 

“They also say, they don’t mind if you… wait. You want to trade in your bond with them?!”, he asked then, his eyes flickering over to Jongdae curiously.

“Well”, Kyungsoo rubbed his neck, suddenly feeling caught. 

“You see, I thought Jongdae could bring back Nini” - 

“Nini?”

“The. Uhm. The monster.”

Minseok looked over to Nini who had gotten back to petting Channie and Baekku, seemingly delighted to be surrounded by the dogs. 

“You know, in the light of day he does not seem that monstrous”, Minseok said then.

“Yeah… I think… Jongdae might be more of a monster than him. Do you really want to go with him?”

Minseok shrugged. 

“I don’t really have a chance, do I? Also, I don’t have a family that worries about me. Not even a dead one… they were all assholes, to be honest. And it might be fun to finally get out of this nest. I don’t understand how you are still here. You could leave any time, you know?”

“Yes, I know. But I like it here”, Kyungsoo said and shrugged, cracking up an egg over the pan and placing some stripes of bacon next to it. 

“I’ll be leaving now. And don’t forget, no matter what”- “Don’t leave the house. Yes, I heard you the first three times,mom”, Minseok interrupted Jongdae, and to Kyungsoo’s delight the necromancer seemed caught of guard yet again, his cheeks turning the lightest shade of pink, as he murmured a quick goodbye and snuck out the door. 

“Does this whole necromancer thing just require to be an asshole?”, Kyungsoo asked, more amused than he liked to admit. 

“Yes”, Nini replied as he emerged from his corner, speaking up for the first time in hours as he came to stand next to them. 

Minseok grinned, looking up to the undead man towering over hm. “I am really beginning to like you,lbig guy. And about Jongdae...don’t worry, I am pretty sure I can handle him.”

  
  
  


Kyungsoo went about his typical work, milking the cows and feeding the hens before inspecting the damages of the storm. 

Miraculously not much damage had been done, aside form a few smashed roof tiles. And well, the sunflowers were definitely done for good, but aside from that his garden had taken very little damage. 

Much to their dismay, Minseok and Nini really found themselves staying indoors all day, since they would have some huge issues on their hands should anybody see either of them outside. 

A supposedly dead, now missing dead boy and the monster who had supposedly killed him making idle conversation would certainly raise some questions. 

Kyungsoo collapsed in his bed for a short nap in the afternoon, only waking up to voices and the smell of dinner a few hours later. 

When he padded over to the kitchen, still half asleep, he found Minseok wearing an apron and stirring potatoes and vegetables over the fire, and Jongdae sitting at the table, deep dark shadows beneath his eyes.

“Hello there, CInderella”, Minseok greeted him. 

Kyungsoo just yawned and dropped at the table, taking the cup of tea Jongdae pushed over into his direction. 

“So?”, he asked. 

Jongdae shrugged. 

“It’s all good. Nobody, really nobody suspects anything, and I am yet again surprised with just how stupid mortals are.”

“Well thank you”, Kyungsoo replied. 

“You’re welcome”, Jongdae said humbly and nodded.

Kyungsoo looked over to Minseok who just shrugged, as if to say ‘well, what are we gonna do about it?’

“What happens next?”   
“I’ll take Minseok home with me to consult my library, and then we go to visit my master. If anybody knows how to resurrect Nini - I mean, Jongin - it is him.”   
“You have a home?”, Minseok asked and placed three plates on the table. 

“Well, yes. I don’t just wander around and kill random people all the time”, Jongdae said with a faint smile. 

“No, I suppose you don’t, considering how clumsily you went about it this time”, Minseok nodded. The necromancer spluttered, not knowing what to reply, and Kyungsoo chose to hide his grin behind a spoonful of food. 

Jongdae swiftly turned around to him, again a faint layer of pink on his ghostly pale cheeks, his words a bit too fast and slurred together. “We will leave after dinner, so if you have any more questions, you better ask them now.”

“I do, actually”, Kyungsoo said and nodded. 

“Minseok, this tastes amazing. Which herbs did you put in here?”

  
  
  


From that day on, Kyungsoo’s daily life took a radical turn. Of course, on the outside nothing much did change.

He still got up early every morning to take care of his animals, milking his cows, feeding them and letting them out onto the meadow behind the barn. He went into town once a week to buy supplies and visit his sister and gossip a bit, always eager to hear if they had any new clues about the monster. 

So yes, Kyungsoo did his best to give the impression that he was living his same quiet old life.

But, what hopefully nobody knew or even suspected was what went on behind the little blue door of the farmhouse. 

On the second day after Jongdae and Minseok had left, Kyungsoo rushed back in after hearing a loud boom, just to find a very upset Nini and a broken shelf. 

Nini seemed terrified he would get punished, and oh boy once Kyungsoo realized that, Jongdae might have call himself lucky that he wasn’t around, or Kyungsoo would have rounded him up so thoroughly no magic would have helped. 

After making sure Nini had calmed down Kyungsoo managed to make up of his words that a very curious Nini had tried to take one of the books of the shelf, managing in the process to somehow knock the whole thing down with his clumsy hands. 

Kyungsoo had picked everything up after putting Baekku in Nini’s lap, since the both of them were about to become the best of friends, and the tiny corgi always put an albeit creepy looking smile on Nini’s face. 

“Would you like to learn how to read, Nini?”, Kyungsoo had asked as he tried to figure out if he could fix the broken thing. 

Nini hadn’t answered, just given a very shy nod, and so that evening after Kyungsoo had eaten dinner, Nini curiously and impatiently watching him, he began to teach the other how to read.

Nini was a patient, albeit slow learner, but with his brain rotting away in his skull, Kyungsoo figured that wasn’t much of a miracle. 

Writing, on the other hand was a different matter. 

Nini’s hands were just too clumsy to take hold of any chalk or feather. 

Instead, Kyungsoo gathered a handful of smaller stones, so Nini could learn to form the letters, one stone at a time. 

His antics were still incredibly cute to Kyungsoo, and all in all he was just sweet, dotting on the dogs, and even on Kyungsoo whenever he could. 

And while Kyungsoo was not really used to getting his head patted or getting back rubs he couldn’t even pretend to not somehow enjoy the whole thing. Apart from that, Nini did have asense of humor, and he managed to surprise Kyungsoo time and time again. 

And, for a few days everything was quite alright.

But, Nini got more and more restless and antsy, not being used to being holed up in a tiny house, since usually he would follow Jongdae around, shielded by the Maestro’s charms. 

Somehow, he just didn’t want to realize he would put his life in danger should he ever step outside the door. 

Kyungsoo tried to explain it, time after time, just to have to place himself in between Nini and the door, again and again, One time even chasing him through the yard and dragging him back inside by the collar of his shirt when a stubborn Nini had just carefully picked him up and placed him back to down at the side so he could get through the front door. 

That was when Kyungsoo got stern with him for the first time, and how he discovered that the undead had one of the meanest cases of puppy eyes he had ever seen, one that even his actual puppies had a hard time to keep up with. 

On day ten Kyungsoo returned in the evening to find all his pillows turned to shreds, and so he reluctantly agreed to let Nini outside for a few hours during the night. 

And soon, he found himself heading to bed after milking the cows in the morning, only getting up when the sun was low. 

He soon figured out NIni was a huge help, transporting things with ease that Kyungsoo would have a hard time to carry. 

For many other tasks Nini was too clumsy to do them properly, but Kyungsoo just couldn’t tell him no, and so he ended up with Nini looking like he had bathed in blood and more crushed berries than actual jam or berry juice. 

But, the monster was just too delighted by the whole thing and Kyungsoo figured there was little harm init. 

One time, when his sister made an unannounced visit he just managed to hide Nini below his covers in time, rushing out into the main room to block the door in just his underwear, which led his sister to believe that he had a secret lover.

Kyungsoo had decided to leave it at that, rather making up a secret forbidden romance than explaining the monster hiding in his bedroom. 

On top of that, Kyungsoo had to admit to himself he was happy. Happier than he had been in years, since his brother had left for the war. 

He found himself doubling over with laughter too often to even count, never getting bored of Nini’s antics, and the way he and the dogs were just too adorable. 

As far as he was considered, life could just go on like this. Of course, though, it didn’t. 

One night, as the two of them sat at the kitchen table once again, Nini haltingly and slowly reading the words Kyungsoo had written down for him, there was a knock on the window. 

Kyungsoo hurled around, heart beating in his throat, while Nini dove below the table with a scared little outcry. 

But, instead of a pale face pressed against the window, there was a huge, black bird with milky white eyes. 

“What the…”

Nini’s eyes appeared over the edge of the table. 

“Oh”, he said and slowly got up. 

“Schuhu”, he said. 

“What.” Kyungsoo replied. 

Nini wordlessly pointed at the bird. 

“That’s...Schuhu?”, Kyungsoo asked slowly, looking again at the huge black thing that hopped around on the windowsill. 

Nini nodded. 

“You… you know that bird?”   
“Master”, Nini simply replied.

Kyungsoo blinked, wondering why the hell the necromancer would send them an abnormally large raven. 

It’s feathers shone like dark oil in the candle light as it impatiently flapped its huge wings, and after a moment Kyungsoo shrugged, walked over and opened the window. 

The bird hopped through, opening his huge wings once again and dropping something on the table before landing on Nini’s shoulder. 

Nini giggled, while Kyungsoo told himself once more that yes, this was real, he wasn’t going mad. 

There was an undead man sitting at his table, and on his shoulder was an undead raven, its wings so wide it wouldn’t even fit through the window should it open them. 

He went over to grab what turned out to be a piece of paper, filled with neat, handsome handwriting. 

_ “Dear friend,  _

_ I am writing this in the hope that you are well. My teacher said I could not use any specific names or information, since this message might get intercepted, so forgive me for keeping this vague.  _

_ My studies are progressing well, and I am slowly getting used to my new state of existence. We have just returned from our journey, and our research regarding our common friend is going better than we expected.  _

_ Jong _ _ \- My teacher says we might have found somebody who can help our friend, and he went off to look for that man. They say he is very skilled and can heal injuries well, so we think he might be of use. If all goes well, we will come to visit you again around the first autumn full moon. I hope you are safe and sound, and I am glad to tell you I am just the same.  _

_ As I told you, you needn’t worry for me, since beyond his exterior my teacher is as harmless as a baby kitten.  _

_ You needn’t reply to this message, just feed our feathered friend a bit of grain (he can’t eat it, but he liked to pick at it) before sending him back.  _

_ ‘Til we meet again, M.” _

Kyungsoo read the message three, four more times while getting out a bowl full of corns for the undead raven, before he threw the piece of paper into the fireplace. 

“Autumn moon… that is just a few more weeks. Do you hear that, Nini? Just about two moon circles, and you will be alive again.”

Nini wasn’t listening, still petting the bird and Kyungsoo smiled, before suddenly he felt a strange pang of pain in his chest. 

It felt bittersweet and familiar, like an old friend, and after a moment Kyungsoo realized it was the same thing he had felt every time he had buried a loved one. 

He turned away, breathing in deep as he clutched his chest. 

For the last few weeks he had chosen not to acknowledge it, but… 

What if this actually worked? If Nini came back to life, he would want to also live his life. 

And of course, Kyungsoo wouldn’t keep him from it. But, there was a fairly big chance NIni wouldn’t want to live here in this boring farmhouse at the end of the world. 

Kyungsoo bit his tongue to keep the tears back. How ironic that he had kept to himself for so long, fearing if he opened his heart, death would take yet another piece of his soul by stealing yet another person he loved. 

Just to lose somebody that he foolishly had opened his heart for yet again, only this time it wouldn’t be death that would take the other from him, but life instead. 

“Soo?”, Nini sounded a bit alarmed as he saw Kyungsoo rubbing at his reddened eyes. 

Kyungsoo smiled. “It’s okay, Nini. Don’t worry. I just stood too close to the fire. Come, let’s carry Schuhu outside so he can fly home now, okay?”

  
  
  
  
  


And somehow, from that day on, time seemed to run through Kyungsoo’s fingers like grains of sand, and he could only watch and force a smile every time Nini got ecstatic about his approaching revival. 

It was like he had only blinked, only taken a few breaths since he had first found himself cowering in fear because of the thing in his barn. And now, he was more terrified of the thought of the same thing being taken away from him. 

Soon he would wake up from nightmares about his family, about how he had lost them, at first every few days, but soon the dreams would return every night. 

Nini was always there, shaking him awake, his throat feeling dry from calling out their names, his cheeks wet with tears, petting Kyungsoo’s hair and making worried, soft sounds in the back of his throat, trying to hum some little melodies he had heard the other sing before, until Kyungsoo would fall back asleep. 

Nini himself didn’t sleep, but they soon figured out Kyungsoo slept better, with lesser nightmares when the other was around, so for the last month or so they drew the blinds shut during the day, Kyungsoo cuddling up against Nini’s chest, letting himself be hugged by his heavy, cool arms, and the earthy moldy scent always surrounding him, Channie curling up next to his feet and Baekku on the pillow next to him, all of them being there to fend off his evil dreams. 

But, despite that the real source of his fears couldn’t be fended off, and it arrived even sooner than expected, three days before the autumn full moon. 

Schuhu was the first envoy of their guests, carrying a short message that they would arrive around midnight, and they waited outside, by the apple tree in the yard. 

The moon was bright, silverish and huge, and it almost was as bright as day, but as if everything had been colored in black ink to drain the color out of it. 

They appeared almost out of nowhere, and Minseok called his name, hugging him tightly. 

“Are you alright?”, Kyungsoo asked a bit worried, noticing the layer of sweat on the other’s face. 

“Yes, Yes I am! Jongdae let me do the masking charm, so I’m a bit tired now, but I’m happy to see you!”

Kyungsoo forced a smile, opening his mouth to lie that yes, he was glad to see them, too. 

But, seeing how excited Nini was basically bouncing up and down in his spot, he found he didn’t have to lie.

“It’s good to see you again”, he said sincerely, as he told himself for the thousands time he couldn’t be so selfish. 

Minseok frowned, opening his mouth, but then a stranger stepped next to them. 

“I am Yixing, it is nice to meet you”, he said, sounding rather formal, his voice lilting with a faint accent, deep dimples in his cheeks. 

Kyungsoo nodded in greeting, not knowing what to say.

“He is the person I told you about in my letter. It’s crazy what he can do!”

“Are you a necromancer, too?”, Kyungsoo asked, causing the other two to laugh. 

“No. Not a necromancer. Quite the opposite. I am… much like you, a farmer. I make things grow, I make them healthy”, Yixing explained. 

“And can you make Nini healthy?” 

Yixing’s gaze flickered over to the undead man next to them. 

“I cannot promise anything, but… I am quite optimistic.”

Kyungsoo nodded, while Minseok stepped aside to greet Nini and the dogs. 

“Jongdae”, he said then, stepping towards the other. 

The necromancer was wearing the same coat as the last time they had met, and he greeted him with the same arrogant little smirk that Kyungsoo always saw him with in his mind when he thought of him. 

“Well, hello there little farmer boy. How did you like taking care of my creature?”

“It was… eventful”, Kyungsoo said. 

Jongdae chuckled. 

“Oh, I am quite ready to believe that Now, shall we get started with the ritual?”, he asked, as he motioned for a group of for undead servants to pull their carriage further into the yard.

“Right now?”, Kyungsoo asked, taken a bit aback. 

“Well, yes. It will take a few hours to prepare, but if everything goes well your favourite undead man will be alive and breathing before the sun rises.”

Kyungsoo felt the same pang in his chest again, heavy and bitter, sweet and wonderful at the same time. 

“You better get started then”, he said flatly, before abruptly turning around and returning to the farmhouse. 

While Minseok and Yixing prepared for the ritual side - again, the table was pushed up against the wall, but this time there were no foul smelling herbs and black candles. 

Nini had been grounded to sitting in a corner, after breaking not one but two of Yixing’s expensive delicate instruments, and now he sat there pouting, and Kyungsoo had decided to sit down next to him, feeling almost guilty at the way he just couldn’t seem to let go, instead soaking up every little moment he could spend with the other. 

Nini absentmindedly fiddled his hands, antsy and nervous as he watched the three magicians preparing the room. 

“Nini, why don’t we practice reading a bit more while we have time?”, Kyungsoo asked, hoping this routine would help to calm the other down. 

The undead just wordlessly shook his head, instead pulling Kyungsoo closer, and he felt like some sort of teddy bear or doll with the way Nini wrapped himself around him. 

“Kyungsoo”, Jongdae said without looking up, an empty hourglass in his hand, his eyes flying over a page in his spells book. 

“Yes?”

“I think it’s about time we extract your memories. We will need them before we start the ritual.”

His throat suddenly felt very dry, as he remembered how last time Jongdae had drained Minseok’s blood and cut runes into his skin. 

“How…?”

Jongdae raised the empty hourglass. 

“Don’t worry, it won’t hurt, but… well, I’ll be scrambling around in your brain. Maybe you will fall unconscious afterwards, maybe you will feel dizzy and disoriented. But, for sure you will be  _ very  _ tired.”

He turned to his former servant. 

“Keep holding him up, just like that”, he ordered and Nini nodded, still silent, giving Kyungsoo’s hand a reassuring squeeze as Jongdae sat down in front of them with his legs crossed. 

“Put your hands around the top of the hourglass and think of your family”, he instructed Kyungsoo in a calm, almost hypnotizing voice, and Kyungsoo felt himself relax a bit. 

Was the magician already doing something to his mind? If he was, Kyungsoo might actually thank him for it, he thought as he put his hands around the glass.

It felt incredibly delicate and thin beneath his fingers, smooth and cool, but already warming to his touch. 

“Don’t worry, Kyungsoo. They want for you to do this. And they still love you very much”, Minseok, who had appeared behind Jongdae’s shoulder said. 

Kyungsoo met his gaze and Minseok gave him a small, reassuring smile. 

He just nodded, feeling tears rise in his eyes as he thought of his family, probably for the last time. 

“Close your eyes”, Jongdae instructed, and so he did, exhaling deeply and leaning a bit more in Nini’s hug, while he felt Jongdae’s slim, cool fingers over his. 

“Now think of them. Conjure up their faces. How they talked, how they moved. The way they laughed. Think of the happiest memories you shared with them.”

For a moment Kyungsoo tensed up, suddenly realizing he was not alone in his head anymore, and just like Jongdae’s nimble fingers, he felt the other’s mind graze against his.

It was not a bad feeling necessarily just...very weird.

He gasped as for a moment he got a glimpse into the other’s mind. 

Grave soil on his hands, the metallic scent of blood coating his mind. Books, so many books, some of them so dark that just looking at them could kill a mortal man. So so much darkness and loneliness and - it all rushed into Kyungsoo’s mind like a storm, and he felt overwhelmed by the vividness of it. 

_ Not that way,  _ he felt Jongdae’s voice in his head more than he heard it. _ Come here, _ a soft touch to his hand, and he was pulled away, towards lightness illuminating a mental picture of Nini. 

_ So he does care about him,  _ Kyungsoo thought, and like a gust of wind Jongdae’s laugh echoed through his head. 

_ Of course I do, he was with me for the biggest part of my existence.  _

Then, there was another glimpse, of Minseok, his long lashes fluttering over his cheeks as he leaned closer, soft lips - 

_ Now you are just being rude. That is private,  _ he heard Jongdae’s voice again, half amused, half embarrassed. 

_ You...and Minseok?,  _ Kyungsoo asked, and for a moment there was silence. 

_ Well… I am ten times as old as he is. By my standards he basically is a child. So… I did not initiate this, but… he can be very… persuasive.  _

Another flash of memories of Minseok’s lips in  _ other  _ places, and Kyungsoo felt his cheeks grow hot. 

_ Uhm… okay. Should we go do the whole losing my happiest memories thing now?,  _ Kyungsoo asked, a bit embarrassed, and Jongdae stayed silent. But, suddenly he was dragged into a vortex of light, and a moment later he found himself down by the lake on a sunny day, his brother screeching in delight, as he grabbed Kyungsoo’s hand, pulling him towards the water. 

Kyungsoo watched as his hand, his body moved away, looking at himself as a kid, while some ghostly shadow of himself was left behind. He felt a presence next to his, and when he looked over Jongdae was next to him, looking at the two children playing in the water. 

_ Do it,  _ Kyungsoo said, and the next moment the memory was pulled from his mind. 

It was like no other thing he had every felt, but if he had to describe it… it was as if Jongdae was pulling a piece of paper away from under his finger tips, and at the same time the world around him seemed to flee away, the image shrinking and shrinking, the noises slowly fading out, the warmth of the sunlight disappearing, until he and Jongdae were left in eternal darkness. 

Kyungsoo turned, taking a deep breath, as he realized a moment ago this darkness must have been filled with…  _ something, _ he just couldn’t remember what it was. 

_ Alright… again, _ he said, thinking of a time in winter when he had helped his mother to prepare cookies and dinner, the snow falling thick outside the windows, and their little hut the only pinpoint of light and warmth in the night. 

The next moment it slipped away, and he was outside the window, the snowy landscape rushing past, and then, that was gone, too. 

They kept going like that, and after the first few it was faster and faster, and Kyungsoo could feel himself sweat, felt his head beginning to ache, as voices in his head seemed to get muffled, faces slowly turning blurry. 

_ We’re done. Good job, Kyungsoo,  _ Jongdae said after a little while, and Kyungsoo breathed a sigh of relief, before suddenly, Nini’s face appeared in front of him. 

_ Can you… can you take him, too?,  _ Kyungsoo asked, and again he felt a pang of hurt in his chest. 

For a moment, Jongdae was silent. 

_ You love him,  _ he then stated the obvious, sounding surprised. 

Kyungsoo didn’t answer. 

_ Why do you want me to take these memories? _

_ I don’t want to lose him, too _ Kyungsoo thought, and he felt a tear run down his cheek, and then Nini hummed the melody he had sung whenever he had waited for Kyungsoo to drift off back to sleep. 

_ You gave so much already. We all need happy memories, and you deserve to keep this. It might hurt now, but it won’t hurt forever. Besides, what makes you so sure you will lose him?,  _ Jongdae asked. 

Before Kyungsoo could reply, the other’s mind slipped from in between his fingers, and the next moment he was back on the hard floor, Nini’s reassuring arms around him, and his cheeks damp with tears. 

“No cry”, Nini said, and softly rocked him. “Soo sad?”, he asked, his voice distressed. 

“No...no, don’t worry. I’m happy”, Kyungsoo assured him and wiped away his tears. 

“Soo?”, he heard Nini ask again, and then, again, everything faded into darkness, only that this time, his mind faded away along with it. 

  
  
  
  
  


When Kyungsoo woke up, it really did feel just like that...like waking up. It took him a moment to realize that something was off - there was no dog fur in his face, and not a heavy warm blob of dog on his feet, and even more importantly, there was no cool ginormous body against his back, only hard wood. 

He shot up, causing MInseok to jump and drop the book he had been holding. 

“Whow! Calm down, everything is okay!”

Minseok said, and grabbed his arm. 

“Nini- where is Nini?”, Kyungsoo asked as he looked around himself. 

He had been laying on the bench beneath the apple tree in the yard, with Xiumin sitting on a wooden chest pushed up against the tree. 

The sun hadn’t risen yet, but the air was already filled with chirping birds and insects buzzing around, pale morning light slowly but surely driving away the darkness. 

“He is still inside. There...have been some unforeseen issues, but, don’t worry. They are patching him up just fine.”   
Kyungsoo got up, stretching his arms and rolling his neck, before stalking off towards the farmhouse. 

“Wait! Kyungsoo, you can’t go in there!”, Minseok called and came after him, quickly catching up. 

“I just want to take a look to see what is going on” - “No! It’s too dangerous. We can’t do anything but wait.”

Kyungsoo stopped, albeit reluctantly, and Minseok heaved a relieved sigh as he pulled him back towards the bench. 

“What happened yesterday?”

Minseok looked tired, and Kyungsoo saw him rub his chest, where Jongdae had cut the mark into his skin. 

“Jongin was worried sick about you. We basically had to tear him away from you to start the ritual. I think Yixing had to talk to him for 10 full minutes to convince him that you were fine, and that you wouldn’t be too happy if he let your sacrifice go to waste by not doing the ritual. 

I basically had to stop Jongdae from just pushing him down on that table and tying him up so we could start”, Minseok said with a giggle. 

“And then?”

Minseok got serious again and shrugged. 

“You know, we are not just performing death or life magic here, but both at the same time. They… usually don’t go together very well, and it's a very unstable equilibrium Yixing and Jongdae have to create. 

Basically, Jongdae needs to retract his magic bit by bit, while Yixing at the same time has to put in his. It is a rather delicate business.”

“How much longer do you think this will take?”, Kyungsoo asked. 

He knew he should go take care of his animals - where were Channie and Baekku, even? - but he just couldn’t bring himself to get up and go about his usual business like nothing was happening. 

Minseok sighed, again, and reopened his book. 

“I don’t know, Kyungsoo. I really don’t - wait.” 

He looked over to the farmhouse, tilting his head as if he was listening to something Kyungsoo couldn’t hear. 

“Oh.” He said then, his eyes going wide. 

“What happened?”, Kyungsoo asked, alarmed as he shot up again. 

“I think they are done”, Xiumin said slowly and got up. 

Kyungsoo jumped to his feet, stalking over the yard, but somehow, that just wasn’t fast enough and so he started to run, slithering to a halt in front of the door and almost crashing into a tired, confused looking Yixing who had just opened it. 

“Oh”, he said a bit surprised as he blinked down at Kyungsoo. 

Kyungsoo didn’t even bother and just got on his tiptoes to glance past him. 

Jongdae was by the fireplace, packing up his equipment, and on the table - 

“Nini”, he breathed, pushing the door open, a few faint rays of sunshine falling through the door. 

The man on the table had his back to him before glancing over his shoulder, his warm brown eyes lighting up as he looked at Kyungsoo. 

“You…”, Kyungsoo started, not knowing what to say. 

“You are smaller.”

Nini seemed surprised, before he giggled, his eyes turning into crescents. 

“Well. Yeah. Uhm. So, this is what I actually look like”, he said, turning on his feet, a lot more elegant than Kyungsoo was used from  _ his _ Nini. His voice wasn’t an unnatural otherworldly growl anymore, instead it was soft and warm, just like his eyes, his skin - Kyungsoo forced to stop himself from ogling the other one, while Jongdae quietly pulled the door behind him shut, plunging the room into pale twilight again. 

For a moment, both of them were quiet, as Kyungsoo tried to get used to the thought that his loveable monster had turned into this incredibly good looking, downright gorgeous guy, with eyes like honey and dark brown hair wildly sticking up in all directions. 

“I… I guess I need to say thank you. I really do. And… I think I will never be able to pay you back for what you did for me”, Jongin said, a pained, almost embarrassed expression on his face as he looked down at Kyungsoo, who waved his words aside. 

“No, really, Soo… thank you so much. Really. If there is anything I can do for you-” 

_ You could stick around to try,  _ a selfish voice in Kyungsoo’s head whispered, but he pushed the thought aside immediately, staring at his feet instead. 

“Don’t worry about it”, he murmured. as he considered just backtracking out the door. 

“I would understand it if you wanted me to leave, after bothering you for such a long time, but…” Jongin’s voice trailed off as he rubbed his neck. 

“Yes?”, Kyungsoo asked. 

“Well”, Jongin grimaced. “Everybody I knew before is dead, and… and I like it here. I like the dogs, and I like the work and… and I like you. I will help you on the farm, if you let me stay. I would understand it if you say no, but… please, Soo?”

The way he tilted his head, looking at his fingers before quickly glancing up at him, it was all so familiar that Kyungsoo stepped closer and grabbed his hand without hesitation. 

“You can stay here as long as you want, Nini”, he said firmly and Jongin looked up at him with a brilliant smile. 

“Thank you”, he said under his breath, and Kyungsoo awkwardly pat his arm before turning around, fleeing back outside, away from the wave of feeling crushing over him, away from the overwhelming urge to hug this guy, protect him from anything this world might throw at him. 

_ Love _ , some part of his mind whispered,  _ maybe it is really as powerful as Jongdae said. _

  
  
  
  
  


Three days later Minseok and Jongdae were packing up to leave. Yixing had already departed the day after the ritual, just taking a quick nap in the shade outside and healing one of the cows who had hurt its ankle, before saying a short goodbye and trodging off towards the forest. 

“He isn’t much of a people’s person, is he?”, Kyungsoo had asked Jongdae who was standing next to him ,watching on as Yixing grew smaller in the distance. 

“No, not really”, a tired looking Jongdae had replied, before shaking his head. 

“The things he could do with his magic...it’s crazy, really. But I think he really doesn’t care too much about it and only wants to help.”

“Well, he sure did help. I can’t believe you really managed to turn Nini human again.”

Jongdae looked over to him, frowning a bit. 

“He isn’t entirely human though, don’t forget that. Some of my magic still resides within him. If somebody was to cut open his chest, they would not find a beating heart within him. He is more… well, we keep him in balance as he is, but he isn’t alive in a human way. I have no idea if he even ages, or if he needs to sleep and eat.”

Kyungsoo shrugged. “We will figure all of that out in time. But really, Jongdae, you can be proud of yourself for this one.”

“Oh, trust me, I know”, the necromancer said, some of the well familiar arrogance sneaking back into his voice, despite the fact he still looked pale and subdued, drained from the ritual, with, deep shadows beneath his eyes. 

“So what will you do now?”, Kyungsoo asked. 

Jongdae shrugged. “We will probably stick around for a few more days. Minseok has some unfinished business in town, and so do I. We’d like to stay, at least for a night or two, if you don’t mind. 

“Of course not”, Kyungsoo replied, surprising himself with how true those words actually were. 

He had enjoyed the solitude and quietness of his hermit life long enough, and over the past weeks he had grown accustomed again to having people around, somebody to talk to (even though conversation with Nini hadn’t been the most mind-stimulating thing.)

Jongdae and Minseok had stayed in his parents’ old room, with Jongin being content curling up on a stack of hay near the fireplace. 

“Is this really okay?”, he had asked as he spread out the blanket and fluffed up the pillows on top of it, looking up at Jongin. 

“Of course it is… also, I can hardly keep staying in your bed now, can I?”, Jongin had asked with an awkward laugh and scratched the back of his neck.

“Haha, yeah of course not”, Kyungsoo had replied, feeling his heart plummet. 

“I mean… if you have nightmares again, or, I don’t know… I’ll be here”, Jongin had said, sitting down on his new bedstead. 

“Okay”, Kyungsoo had said, still feeling awkward, silence settling between them once again. 

“Good night”, he had said then, hearing Jongin whispering “Goodnight, Soo” under his breath before he pulled the door shut, leaning back against it and sliding down to the floor, just staring into empty space for a few minutes before he managed to pull himself up and actually go to bed. 

How was this so hard? Jongin was just a couple of feet away, and yet it felt like the distance stretched out endlessly. 

Well, maybe not the distance. But so much had changed. 

Some part of him still wished Jongdae would have taken these memories away, too. 

But, at the same time he knew he was glad he would get the memories at least, if he got to keep nothing else. 

Jongin was free to live his life, Kyungsoo had no right to him, and he would let him go and say goodbye with a smile, even if it would break his heart. 

He turned around on the mattress, absentmindedly petting Baekku who was cuddled into his side. 

There were still two fluffy dogs in the bed with him, and yet it did seem too big, too empty now. 

_ I changed, too, _ he thought as he stared up into the darkness. 

Kyungsoo had always thought he was content with his life, but...maybe he just was content with the fact how there was no risk, nothing to lose. 

Two nights ago he had lost his family yet again, and he had gained a strange group of people he would almost call friends in return. 

He had seen behind the quiet, peaceful stage setting of the world, had seen ancient dark magic and things his mind couldn’t even begin to comprehend.    
And somehow… somehow all of it was okay. 

He smiled to himself. 

_ It is worth it. In the end, even if I lose everything, I will still be glad for everything that happened. I wouldn’t change a thing.  _

With that thought in mind he fell asleep, his mind fading into blissful, nightmare-free darkness, for the first time in weeks. 

  
  
  
  


“You should come visit us some time”, Minseok suggested. 

“Maybe I will”, Kyungsoo nodded. And maybe he would. He had still never left the little valley, and he didn’t really feel the need to explore the big wide world still, but it would be nice to meet Minseok, and maybe even Jongdae, again. 

The two of them were watching as Jongin helped Jongdae load their things up onto a little cart, pulled by another undead (this one really, truly undead) man, that Jongdae had ‘parked’ in the barn for the duration of their stay. 

Jongin had demanded it would be him to help his old master, and Minseok had quickly yielded his place. Both him and Kyungsoo had watched in curiosity at this new weird friendship blossoming between the necromancer and his former servant. 

Jongin seemed to know basically everything that was there to know about Jongdae, after all, he had 100 years to get to know him. And, he seemed to like the other very much. 

Jongdae, on the other hand was awkward, seemingly embarrassed and squirming whenever Jongin mentioned anything that had happened in their shared past, and Kyungsoo could understand why. 

After all, Jongdae has basically treated Jongin like a mindless slave for a full century, and Kyungsoo was still ready to give him a piece of his mind about it. 

But, seeing how Jongdae cowered beneath Jongin’s gazes made him think that maybe the necromancer didn’t need a dressing down about this. Plus, this was Jongin’s business, he reminded himself, and he had no right to speak in the other’s name. 

“What about Jongin?”, Minseok asked, pulling him from his thoughts

“What about him?”, Kyungsoo asked, sounding a bit more rough than he had planned to. 

“You both need to come visit.”

“Minseok, I don’t think Jongin will stay with me for much longer”, Kyungsoo sighed, surprised when Minseok burst into laughter. 

“Are you serious? God, I can’t believe you two. Kyungsoo…”, Minseok shook his head. 

“First, you bring the guy back from the dead, getting yourself involved with necromancers and dark magic, and now you are too much of a coward to confess your love to him?”

“I don’t love” - “Oh, spare me, Kyungsoo”, Minseok said, sounding half amused, half annoyed as he crossed his arms. 

“Jongin  _ adores  _ you. He is just scared you are getting sick of him, scared you are grossed out by the whole alive-dead-alive thing.”

“I’m not! And I could never grow tired of him!”, Kyungsoo protested. 

“Well, don’t tell me. Go and tell him, duh”, Minseok said in a voice that made it obvious he thought Kyungsoo was an idiot. 

As Kyungsoo only looked at him blankly, he gave him a reassuring pat on the shoulder, before waving goodbye and walking over to Jongdae and Jongin, who were hugging each other. 

Jongdae stepped back and looked at Kyungsoo, a faint smirk on his face. 

“I’m kind of glad I didn’t kill you that night in the barn”, he said then, and Kyungsoo breathed a surprised laugh. 

“Yeah. So am I. I’m kind of glad you are not as much of an asshole as you want people to believe… that’s a compliment”, he added, when the necromancer rose a sharp eyebrow. 

They shook hands, then Kyungsoo stepped back next to Jongin, the both of them watching on as the little group began to move, Minseok murmured something, and just a breath later their shapes began to swim and disappear. 

Kyungsoo thought of what Minseok had just told him. Maybe the other was wrong? But Minseok had seemed so convinced, so sure Jongin might actually care about him. 

The boy was snarky and still young, but he wasn’t dumb. He could figure out people’s minds a lot better than Kyungsoo. 

He glanced over to Jongin, who seemed lost in his own thoughts, nervously fiddling with his hands, a habit he still had. 

“Jong- Nini”, he began, before he could lose his new-found confidence. 

Jongin turned, his eyes widening when Kyungsoo took a step forward. 

But, he didn’t move back, and he seemed more surprised than bothered by how close Kyungsoo was. 

“I don’t want you to leave”, Kyungsoo said, and Jongin’s mouth dropped open in surprise. 

“I know it’s not my place to tell you what to do, but… I want to get to know you. The real you. And I just… I hope you will stick around to give me a chance”, he finished, a bit lamely, and for a moment Jongin seemed to shocked to even reply. 

Then he blinked, grabbing Kyungsoo’s wrist and pulling him closer to completely close the distance between them. 

“Kyungsoo, I waited longer than a lifetime to meet somebody like you. All I know is, that I want to be with you. And if it took for me to die and to come back from death to be with you, then I really don’t mind”, he replied, his voice a bit breathless and his cheeks red, as he spoke more sentences than he would usually say in the span of a few hours.

Kyungsoo was surprised by how bold, how honest the other’s words were, and he most of all by how true they felt. If only, he would have the words to tell Jongin he felt all the same. 

But, talking had never been his forte. He just wished he could let Jongin know how much he actually cared about him. 

He took a deep breath, got up on his toes and pressed his lips against Jongin’s. 

The other one went rigid with surprise for a moment, then he seemed to melt into the kiss, smiling as he pulled Kyungsoo closer and held him tight, so tight like he never ever planned on letting go. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I have created a monster! ... or, well. at least I tried to, by stealing some inspiration from Frankenstein. I don't think it really worked, writing about idiots falling in love and everybody being dorky and best friends always gets the best of me.  
> Listen, I know this prompt called for a cute short funny story, but... somehow this happened. I don't know.  
> I had a lot of fun writing it, and I hope, some of you will enjoy reading it as well!
> 
> PS: I love Jondgae, but I am legaly obliged (by myself) to turn him into a sarcastic asshole in every single one of my stories. I don't know why. It just be like that sometimes :)


End file.
